A is for 'Alter the Universe

A-Z Writing Snips

One thing I love about writing fiction and especially fantasy fiction is the way the universe is yours to manipulate. Change the town, the cities, the countries and even the planet itself. Don’t play by the rules of physics!

Invent something that changes the rules and laws of the universe to suit your needs. Or better yet, create your own world and form the rules there. A word of caution as you bend the world to your will like inception’s bad nightmare once you’ve changed the rules, you have to follow their altered paths. If you create a universe, you have to follow the rules you establish otherwise it will seem fake. The key to altering the universe is making your readers believe it!

A is for ‘Alter the Universe’

You’ve crash landed on an alien world. What creatures live there?

What do they breathe? And how will you survive?

Crash at Crater Creek

Jenny Jonas, the first female to reach an alien planet through wormhole technology. Jenny Jonas, first African American female astronaut to discover the direct routs via wormholes to distant planets past Alpha Centauri. And now, Jenny Jonas, crash lands on an alien world and becomes stranded with a busted ship.

Jenny, wearing a lightweight space suit in a stylish lavender, surveyed the damage to the landing gear. She popped the ‘hood’ and stared in disbelief at the structural damage of the main engine core. The solo mission had started out so promising. She’d been able to capture faint thermo images on the purple hazed alien world and concluded that life might exist below on the surface of what the images calculated to be a jungle-like world teeming with life. Her stealth followup below the atmosphere revealed a disturbing conflict between the components of the outer atmosphere and her engines’ ability to function. She’d stalled just as she’d come through the purple haze cloud that protected the surface below.

The area around her crash site looked more like a desert without a hint of life in any direction. The atmospheric readings on her visor revealed a unique chemical blend to the air around her: Oxygen-21% and Helium-79%, breathable but she kept her helmet in place as a precaution.

Kicking the dust from her heavy boots, she went back inside to find the tools and spare parts needed to get off the ground again. Her readings on the thermo images could be anything and she didn;t want to remain vulnerable any longer than necessary After finding a replacement part for her engine and a large wrnch to fix the landing gear she headed toward the hatch and pressed the lever to open the door.

She gasped and stared at the landscape before her. Once desolate, dry and barren, now the jungle she’d been sure was here has appeared out of nowhere. Large plant-like structures rose high into the sky, their colors tinted to the lavender of her space suit. Other smaller plants swayed in the non-breeze while flowers in hundreds of purple shades popped up from the once dead planet surface. As Jenny stepped out of her craft, the plants moved to give her room as she made her way to the damaged areas of her ship. She stepped very carefully so as not to harm any of the plant-like creatures as they seemed to follow her with keen interest.

“Hi,” she said, her voice muffled by the helmet. “Sorry for the mess. I’ll just clean this all up and be on my way.” A rather gangly vine descended upon her and with the deftness of fingers, unlatched and lifted the helmet from her head in one quick move.

“Hey!” Jenny shouted in an awfully high pitched voice. She giggled in spite of herself. The plants around her moved closer quite eager to explore their new toy. Their petals and leaves softly rubbed against her suit.

“I just need to make a repair and I’ll be on my way,” Jenny squeaked out.

“No need to hurry!” they said in equally high pitched eagrness. “We like visitors!”